Mike Hamel's Cancer Journey

Here's a clip of a video about my friend Mike Hamel.

Today I was reading Judges 6, and this portion of a verse jumped out at me: "Go in the strength you have" (Judges 6:14). God told Gideon to use the strength he had--not the strength he wished he had, or the strength of another person, just the strength he already had. Gideon argued that he was the weakest person from the weakest family. However, God delights in using weak people. Moses made the same argument, yet became one of the greatest servants of God.

In writing about his thorn in the flesh, Paul wrote: "Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong" (2 Cor 12:8-10).

I have to ask myself, "Am I delighting in my weaknesses? And am I doing what God has called me to do in the strength I already have?"

John Piper and Philippians

Last night, as I was going to sleep, I listened to a sermon by John Piper, "Holding Fast the Word of Life in 2010." I'd heard about how he recited the whole book of Philippians. That's an understatement. He becomes the apostle Paul writing to the Philippians. I watched the video today. The audio is moving; the video is amazing.

After Philippians, he gave a sermon that convicted me about my Bible reading. If you want to watch, here it is:.